World Food Programme Fighting Hunger Worldwide

A farming ban imposed on Rwandan refugees in southwestern Uganda is raising concerns for their food security, while proposed cash transfers could boost both food prices and theft, warn aid workers and local officials, who are urging the government to rescind the directive. "The situation with the Rwandan refugees remains unclear. They were stopped from cultivation so as to encourage them to voluntarily return home but the number of those who left is low," Festo Wafuta, the senior Ugandan official in the Nakivale camp, told IRIN. "As yet we do not have a clear solution from the government about the Rwandans; right now most of them are relying on food distributed by WFP [UN World Food Programme]."

Kambasa Salimu is severely malnourished. At five years old, he has a body mass index of a four months old child. Weighing only 8.4 kg and 85 cm in height, he is emaciated with a protruding stomach and has powdery patches all over his skin. (..)“Chronic hunger is a problem throughout south-western Uganda,” says World Food Programme Country Director, Stanlake Samkange, “Despite the large amounts and varieties of food that the people grow, research shows that they generally lack adequate knowledge on appropriate nutrition for pregnant women and young children.”

Housing Finance Bank has introduced a new loan product targeting warehouse depositors of agriculture commodities.“This loan is intended to help farmers whose produce are deposited in certified warehouses or during the transaction process (..). Nuwagaba said the current pricing barometer will be based on indicative prices issued from the Uganda Coffee Development Authority for coffee and World Food Programme tender prices for maize and beans.

Inadequate healthcare is just one of many challenges facing the 16,200 refugees in this sprawling camp in western Uganda, which is served by a single doctor. (..)The situation is dire, especially for those Rwandans who have been in Uganda longer than two years, as they no longer receive food rations from the UN World Food Programme (WFP).

With at least 67,000 refugees in southwest Uganda, the government and aid workers are still battling inadequate resources in what a UN official described as a "silent emergency".(..)Stanlake Samkange, Uganda's WFP country director, told IRIN the project, due to begin in April, would help improve the plight of Rwandan refugees who have not been receiving food as they are long-time residents – some for up to 14 years.

Five-year-old Salim Habasa wants to play football like other boys of his age, but he cannot. (..) Habasa was not the only malnourished child at Nyahuka Health Centre when World Food Programme (WFP) officials visited at the end of last month to launch a campaign against child malnutrition.

LOW output has affected the World Food Programme (WFP) local produce purchase project. Stanlake Samkange, the country director, said last year, the UN food agency recorded the lowest annual bean purchases in Uganda in three years.

Landslides triggered by torrential rainfall in eastern Uganda have claimed at least 80 lives, with over 300 others listed as missing, the United Nations humanitarian arm reported today. (..) The UN and its partners today dispatched two teams " comprising representatives from the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the World Food Programme (WFP), the UN Children"s Fund (UNICEF) and others " to assess the situation.

Bundibugyo district has launched a chronic hunger sensitisation campaign that will target children younger than five-years old. (..) “Malnutrition is one of the major causes of infant and child mortality and undermines the mental capacities of a child,” the World Food Programme country representative, Staniake Semkange said.

The price of maize has gone down because of a bumper harvest in the season ending 2009/10. After the poor food production of 2008/2009, farmers across the country focussed on growing maize when the price shot up to sh900 a kilo. (..) The main maize export markets for Uganda are Sudan, Kenya and the World Food Programme (WFP).